Should he decide to run for president in 2008, former New York City Mayor Rudy Giuliani would start off as the frontrunner in the Iowa caucuses, according to a survey conducted in the state earlier this month.

_________________"If the people allow private banks to control their currency the banks and corporations will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." - Thomas Jefferson

In the course of the New Hampshire primary, Darren Garnick, a writer for Slate.com., set out on a quest to photograph his 5-month-old daughter Dahlia being held by every one of the candidates.

Barack Obama held little Dahlia like someone who knows his way around babies, cradling her securely and looking into her eyes. "I would vote for him just for that," was Stacy's comment on the photo.

Hillary Clinton also got a top score from Garnick. "Hillary's a natural," he said. "She was very warm."

In the photo with Rudy Giuliani, however, Dahlia is wailing and Giuliani seems almost as upset. "Rudy wasn't happy," said Garnick. "Dahlia smiled for the first two seconds and then she started crying and Rudy was panicky. ... He didn't want to be photographed with a screaming baby. ... He tossed her right back to me like a football."

Dahlia also cried when John McCain held her, but McCain is laughing about it in the photo. "I do think it's significant to compare the personalities of McCain and Giuliani," said Garnick. "When the baby started to cry with Giuliani, Giuliani basically shoved the baby back in my face. When the baby cried with McCain, McCain was like, 'Okay, I got a crying baby.' And he made a joke that 'there goes another vote.'"

...she did tend to cry more with the Republicans than with the Democrats."

...Even more remarkable, this was the second time in three primary elections that the former New York City mayor ended up behind five of his GOP competitors -- including Ron Paul.

Despite spending an estimated $40 million in his pursuit of the White House, Giuliani has nary a primary victory to show. His political prospects have dimmed sharply in the past few weeks even as the Republican election has remained unpredictably wide-open. Indeed, the fact that Giuliani still stands a chance of grabbing the nomination - if he could pull off a victory in the upcoming Florida election - is more a credit to the weakness of the GOP, observers say, than to Giuliani's particular strengths.

"His strategy, to be blunt, was a stupid strategy and sometimes stupid things work," said Larry Sabato a professor of political science at the University of Virginia. "If he wins Florida he will get a slingshot and everyone will call them brilliant, but in retrospect it was incredibly stupid of Giuliani not to pick one of the primaries. He could have easily have filled the slot that McCain filled in New Hampshire."

For months, Giuliani has insisted that he could secure the nomination by winning the larger, late voting primaries. And yet, despite putting all his eggs into the Florida basket, signs suggest that the New York Republican is mostly rudderless in the Sunshine State....

_________________"If the people allow private banks to control their currency the banks and corporations will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." - Thomas Jefferson

Rudy Giuliani was once the national Republican frontrunner. As late as mid-November, he was the frontrunner in Michigan. He now finishes last nationwide.

Now he’s just the odd man out.

Republicans have now held three major primary contests - Iowa, New Hampshire, and Michigan. And the proud Giuliani has now finished twice behind Texas Rep. Ron Paul, the man he once accused of blaming America for “inviting the attack of 9/11.” He even trails Paul in delegates to this fall’s convention - and the way things are going, he may never catch up. This week, he squeaked out a victory over “uncommitted” and Duncan Hunter. His performance was so bad in Michigan that almost nothing useful can be gleaned about it from the exit polling.

Giuliani’s so-called “late-state strategy” meant that he was to win big in Florida and in the delegate-rich states that vote on February 5. It did not necessarily include victories in the early contests. But neither did it include such dramatic defeats as he has now experienced. After finishing with four percent in Iowa and three percent in Michigan, if Rudy weren’t Rudy, he’d be a footnote. The large leads he once enjoyed in the early states evaporated quickly and before these contests ever took place, putting him at the bottom of the heap in a matter of weeks....

ORLANDO, Fla. — Rudy Giuliani, who bet his presidential hopes on Florida only to come in third, prepared to quit the race Tuesday and endorse his friendliest rival, John McCain.

The former New York mayor stopped short of announcing he was stepping down, but delivered a valedictory speech that was more farewell than fight-on.

Giuliani finished a distant third to winner John McCain and close second-place finisher Mitt Romney. Republican officials said Giuliani would endorse McCain on Wednesday in California. The officials spoke on condition of anonymity in advance of the public announcement.

"I'm proud that we chose to stay positive and to run a campaign of ideas in an era of personal attacks, negative ads and cynical spin," he said as supporters with tight smiles crowded behind him....

he now has thrown his support to mccain who is nothing but a bushicon rubberstamp of every failed policy that g.w. has propagated.

i'm kinda lookin forward to all the bashing i'll be able to do when the repugs finally settle on either mccain or romney.

i've already started my assault on the majority local repug populace here in central pa by submitting my monthly editorial letters in the altoona mirror. februrarys letter is on the bullcrap over the torture issue, januarys was on the failed socalled surge in iraq.

don't know what i'll write about in march............any suggestions?

actually it's quite easy to come up with a derogatory subject that'll easily offend repugs. the bushicons make it so easy to pick from a plethora of topics almost as if they seem to do the writing for you. one juicy one i'm kinda sitting back on is the lobbying scandal with all the web of lies that tie abramoff, delay, rove and the rest of the bushicon cabal together. i'm thinkin i may wait on that one until the final candidates are announced.

but yeah ole rudy has played about as much of the 9/11 rerun as he could and it didn't work.

_________________"If the people allow private banks to control their currency the banks and corporations will deprive the people of all their property until their children will wake up homeless on the continent their fathers conquered." - Thomas Jefferson